


Arha's Shadow

by Miss M (missm)



Category: Earthsea - Ursula K. Le Guin
Genre: F/F, Gen, POV Minor Character, Tombs of Atuan, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-14
Updated: 2012-09-14
Packaged: 2017-11-14 06:02:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/512099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missm/pseuds/Miss%20M
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three people who love the Eaten One, each in their own way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Arha's Shadow

**Author's Note:**

> First posted to my LJ in August 2009.

Manan loves the child right from the moment she arrives, small and wide-eyed between the tall guards and priestesses. It is a profound, unconditional love, perhaps resembling the love a father may have for his daughter -- he will never know. But this girl needs him, and when he sees her press her lips together to keep them from trembling, her small hands curling into fists, his heart aches with an inexplicable pain.

Only sometimes, when he watches her dance in front of the Throne, knives fluttering from hand to hand, does he remember that there was another time, another place; that he, too, has known departure, desolation, the glimmer of steel. He shudders then, and closes his eyes, for there is no point in missing what is forever lost, and this girl needs him.

In her gaze, albeit more and more rarely, he still sees the shadow of his childhood.

 

***

 

Thar is not a sentimental woman, nor is she stupid. This is the way things are meant to be; Arha will die and Arha will come back, completely different but still herself. No two summers are the same. The river is always the river, with its ever-changing water.

But it is still hard, not to remember.

She is not sentimental, but she is faithful. She does not want to forget, but forty years of friendship mean nothing when she is the only one who recalls them -- and so she must let go.

Thar squares her shoulders, purses her mouth, and vows to teach the girl all she can. Arha needs her, still.

 

***

 

Penthe is afraid of the dark, has always been. Therefore, it makes sense for her to be afraid of Arha, and she is, but it's a strange, tingling fear, more compelling than repulsive. All she knows is that when Arha tells her to come, she comes; and when Arha tells her to stay, she stays; and when Kossil's whip falls on her back, she only knows she must not scream, not while Arha is watching.

Sometimes, when she can't sleep at night, she thinks of the Small House, wondering whether Arha is sleepless as she is, all alone in her bedroom where nobody is allowed to enter without permission. Penthe thinks -- she wishes... But no, it's impossible, it can never be; if Arha were to live here, among all the normal girls, she would not be Arha. And what, then, would she be to Penthe?

She sighs instead, turning to lie on her back, letting her body do as it pleases, but softly, quietly. Afterward she curls up, closing her eyes and trying not to think too much about the dark surrounding her.


End file.
